


National anthem

by HarperHolmes



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Beautiful Golden Fools, F/M, Sibling Incest, Twincest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-15 05:02:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28932954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarperHolmes/pseuds/HarperHolmes
Summary: Roaring family living in roaring twenties
Relationships: Cersei Lannister/Jaime Lannister, Robert Baratheon/Cersei Lannister
Comments: 41
Kudos: 83





	1. Born to die

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This is the first fic I publish on ao3. It was written almost a year ago, when I was writing my thesis, which was based on F.S.Fitzgerald's novels The Great Gatsby and Tender is the Night. I was very impressend and i'm also a huge fan of got so it brought me here... hope you enjoy it.
> 
> I'm sorry for possible mistakes. English is not my mother tongue (first it was written in my native language) and I'll be obliged if you correct them:)

The spring of 1924 in New York was warm. Warm enough so Tyrion’s brother, Jaime, was sweating profusely, tucking the suitcases in his Mercedes 24/100/140 PS, which has recently entered the market. The neckband of his shirt was unbuttoned and the sleeves were turned up, but Tyrion could not revert his eyes from his back and arm muscles, rippling under the damp cloth.

He will never be able to look the same way.

“So what do you have on your mind?” he asked, lighting up the cigarette. Next year will be not only his big birthday, but also ten years since he started to enrich his lungs with cigarette ash. “I mean… Maybe I could join you?”

Jaime answered with his head in the car interior.

“Florence, Lake Garda, Lake Como, Milan maybe… then Riviera — there we are going to stay.”

“Como, Milan… Wait. For how long do you intend to…”

“For the whole summer,” his brother answered, and Tyrion could not ignore his annoyed tone. “The doctor said that the climate would be good for the children.”

Tyrion shook his head. “It’s inappropriate for a woman to travel alone.”

“She’s not alone,” roared Jaime, and Tyrion saw how strained his back was — the braces were about to bite the dust.

“I meant without a man.”

“She’s with a man.”

“I meant without her man.”

Jaime finally got out of the car and breathed out loudly; there were beads of sweat on his forehead and jaw muscles were moving. “Robert’s stuff at work should not spoil the children’s summer, right?” he asked, smiling unkindly.

Tyrion shrugged off the question and left him to himself. When it came to their sister, Jaime was very difficult to deal with. And has always been.

He was born at the dawn of the new century — two years later than his siblings. Tyrion liked to think that these Greek gods — beautiful on the outside, and, as it turned out, rotted inside — were so greedy that they took all their mother’s health. And he, the younger brother, got literally half of what was needed.

But everything would be almost fine if the mother had not died. Of course, having a special kid is always heartbreaking, but when his birth is followed by a funeral ...The father was left alone with three children: he had neither the time nor the desire to raise them. Accompanied by nannies from Europe which were fluent in French, the children grew up like weeds in a beautiful garden full of temptations, wealth and luxury. His father's entire contribution consisted of full material support and edifying stories about the greatness of the family, which accompanied each breakfast since he, Tyrion, reached the age of twelve. They were intended, of course, for the older brother, handsome and not flawed, but he still listened. You never know what will prove useful.

He used to have a good relationship with his brother Jaime: as a child, Jaime was not greedy for toys and was happy to help paint animals in coloring pages. The small age difference allowed them to find some common ground — but this strategy did not work with their sister.

Cersei hated him from the very day that a logical chain was closed in her brain: the death of her mother was following the birth of her brother. She accused him of this after five, ten, fifteen, twenty years of her life — and her hatred was as strong as faith in God in any American. One day, Tyrion got used to it and even learned how to get satisfaction from her face twisted with anger — but beautiful even at such moments.

The sister was beautiful, he understood that early. Ever since Cersei turned fourteen, bouquets could be harvested every morning on the doorstep of their residence in the Hamptons. Each was accompanied by a note stating that so-and-so, the son of such-and-such, would be madly happy if his sister agreed to go on a date with him. These love letters were all carbon-copies, and Cersei used them to light the fireplace on those rare days when it was kindled.

It didn't stop her from going on dates though.

A couple of years later, for the birthday, their father gave the twins identical cars: white for Cersei and red for Jaime. Later, it was this difference in color that helped Tyrion to reveal the secret, after which his brother was not the same for him ever again.

In 1915, Jaime went to university. Dad insisted on Oxford, which he had once graduated from, but his brother flatly refused — and chose Yale. Cersei stayed at home — and Tyrion's everyday life would have turned into an absolute hell, if not for the books that he swallowed indiscriminately.

New Haven's relative proximity allowed his brother to come home on weekends and participate in family affairs. That summer the twins did nothing but visit guests and parties. On that summer day in 1916, they left, each in their own direction: Jaime headed for New York, while Cersei wanted to visit some acquaintance on Long Island.

It was about midnight when the Lannister mansion on Casterly Road fell asleep. The house looked like a huge Cyclops with one single orange eye from the side wall: it was Tyrion who intended to finish reading Stendhal and did not extinguish the lamp. Only a couple of pages remained until the end of the last chapter, but the silence of the hot July night was broken by the roar of the engine — deliberately muffled, but perceptible enough for a not sleeping person.

Tyrion pinched the page with his finger and walked to the window, trying not to stick out too much: Jaime or Cersei, it’s all one: it would be useful to have sensitive information about both. Whoever it was, it was strange: they usually returned early or did not return at all, showing up for breakfast the next morning. In the streetlights, he saw a shiny red hood. Tyrion had already turned away from the glass, intending to return to reading, when there was the sound of first one and then the second closing door. He was not alone! This was even more interesting than the “The Charterhouse of Parma”. He pressed himself against the wall, barely looking out the window, and saw his brother, who was leading a girl by the hand to the fountain. Tyrion's mouth took the shape of the letter “o” when the girl, coming out of the dark and removing her hat, turned out to be his sister. Tyrion's jaw dropped to the floor as Jaime took her face with both hands and pressed his lips to hers.

They kissed long and passionate, until Cersei whispered something in his ear and they entered the house. Tyrion's heart thrashed against his chest in such a frenzied rhythm that continuing the reading was next to unreal. As well as trying to fall asleep.

Suddenly it became clear why Jaime insisted on Yale — everything to be closer to his sister. It also became evident why Cersei had not found a permanent admirer by the age of eighteen — she already had one. Tyrion suddenly seemed to see the light: he began to notice how Jaime's face was brightening when she entered the room, and darkening when partners came to their father with sons of their own age. He got drunk on jealousy when Cersei was polite at dinner, answering that she would definitely come to Rhaegar Targaryen’s birthday party.

When he went to Sunday service for the first time, after seeing brother and sister kissing in the garden, there was only one question in his head: “Why has not the earth opened wide yet and Hell has not swallowed them up?” They sat on the pew next to him, in the church, listening to one sermon with him, and meanwhile no punishment of God fell on their heads. Then the guy first thought about the fact that God may not exist. If He did, He would not have allowed this.

And then America entered a war.

His father forbade his brother to leave the university, but Jaime was difficult to stop when he had already made a decision. At first, he and Cersei exchanged letters, then switched to short telegrams, and then it somehow ended. Nobody knew the reason.

When Tyrion was thirteen, his father decided he had grieved enough and had a mistress. Her name was Lara: red-haired, slightly younger than father, greedy for jewelry and with a face not disfigured by the intellect. Very soon she moved in with them in the status of their father's concubine. From Jaime he heard that she really wanted to have a child, but dad said that he “already had brainless offsprings and that’s enough.”

Then she sang another song, called “Tywin, living in sin is not as others do.” Everybody knew what she was trying to achieve, and even more it was obvious to father. And yet he began to give up positions, more and more often he promised that he would think about it, and Cersei could not stand it anymore.

Obviously, Lara overheard one of those fiery monologues in which his sister begged father not to let this woman get so close. She overheard it and decided that Cersei needed to be eliminated, as a destructive element that undermined the overall mission. The plan for this was chosen without risk of loss.

_“Your daughter is nineteen already,” she remarked casually over dinner while Cersei was staying with Aunt Genna. “Have you already started looking for a husband for her?”_

Tyrion was then very surprised by the father’s reaction: he seemed to have completely forgotten that time had the ability to rush at a terrible speed. He delegated this important task — the search for a husband for his only daughter — to his mistress, setting only a few conditions: rich, but not all that much, handsome, but not all that much, ambitious, but… you know.

Lara found one in just a month, and together with father, they persuaded Cersei to go on one date with him at least.

The proposal came a month later, on Christmas Day, and at the same time, the family lost touch with Jaime.

Cersei asked for time to think about the answer, and when it expired, she agreed, but with only one condition. _The wedding will take place when Jaime returns from the front line._ Father did not find anything reprehensible in this request, but Lara, of course, got angry. Suddenly, she found support in the person of the groom, Robert Baratheon — he also did not consider the presence of the bride's brother at the wedding something obligatory.

  
“Is Tyrion going to attend? So what are we talking about?” he laughed.

Only then did he realize that he felt sorry for her: she continued to send telegrams to Jaime's old address, but still did not receive an answer. She probably hoped that he would return and save her from all of them: Lara, Robert, their father, and from Tyrion. So Cersei fought from winter to June, but the forces were unequal: in the end, by threatening to terminate the engagement, Robert (and Lara) got the way. The wedding was arranged in July 1918, loudly and magnificently, and immediately after it, the newlyweds left for their honeymoon — to Italy.

If sister could have known that Jaime would return home in two weeks, she would have fought till the end.

That morning he ran into the dining room in a shabby uniform, with a month-old stubble, but he was happy as never before.

“Hello everyone,” he exclaimed enthusiastically, looking around the bewildered faces at the table. “Where’s Cersei?”

Lara got over the surprise very fast, and replied, slightly stammering, that Cersei had been married for two weeks and no longer lived here. Tyrion still remembered what had happened to his brother's face at that moment: it froze with a bloodless mask, and only pale, chapped lips were moving. “I see. I did not know.”

They all went to meet her; Lara even bought flowers and handed them to Jaime so that he would give it to her personally. “She will be delighted with your return,” she said without a second thought, and Tyrion saw his brother silently looking at the flowers and grinning under his breath.

Robert was the first to descend from the landing stairs: tanned, broad-shouldered, raven-haired, he was seven years older than Cersei. He was entering that satiated with pleasures age when a man had seen enough, and he was ripe to become the head of a new family — ready to guide and teach an ephemeral airy creature wearing dresses made of pink organza. But his sister’s husband did not leave his bachelorism at all: even at his own wedding he danced as if he had not drunk half of the illegal alcohol himself. And she didn’t look like a docile wife either; Tyrion was young, but he figured out what were the laws this world lived by. _People don’t change._

_“Sir,” smiled Robert, drawing his father into an embrace that was opposed to the latter._

_“Madam,” his eyes were ingratiating, while he was kissing Lara's hand._

At that moment, Tyrion watched a completely different show, no worse than Broadway: his sister saw Jaime before she got down to the ground, and if it was not Cersei, she would definitely faint. She only grabbed the handrail more tightly, with her nylon-gloved hand straightening the string of pearls around her neck, sighed and took a few more steps.

_“Robert,” Baratheon held out his hand to Jaime. “Glad to meet you finally. Let's be brothers.”_

_“Surely”, he answered, shaking the hand offered to him._

Lara kissed Cersei on both cheeks, as if she was not responsible for her early expulsion from the inhabitants of the house. Jaime waited patiently for his turn, standing behind them all; Tyrion could see the lightning bolt in his eyes, and how diligently Cersei was averting hers. But no one would have left them in peace so easily; everyone longed for a spectacle, a twins’ reunion after a long separation, an almost biblical return of the prodigal son.

Jaime was not going to do any of it.

_“Very glad to see you,” he said evenly, handing her a bouquet of white peonies. They merged with her dress and white skin: unlike Robert, her tan was not even golden._

_“How long have you been back?” she asked, hiding her face in flowers._

_“Three weeks ago.”_

_“Just kiss him already,” it was Lara, whose dramatic heart dreamed of a good ending to the story, which she, in her deep conviction, wrote all by herself. Father was standing a little further away and was in command of the porters who carried sister's suitcases to the cars._

_Cersei obediently got up on her small heels and kissed Jaime on the cheek. He didn't even twitch, only pursed his lips as she pulled away._

Cersei moved to New York: Robert worked in the city and did not want to spend hours every day driving to his work. Jaime did not return to university: father endured six months, referring to possible stress and adaptation to the old way, and then posed the question point-blank: what was he going to do in life? It wasn’t about money: any of Tywin Lannister's three children could not work even a day in their lives. But for this you also need to do something. Sometimes. Jaime refused to follow in his father's footsteps; according to Tyrion, Jaime hated being associated with this family. In one of such, difficult for his older brother, conversations he intervened, offering him a hand, which Jaime grabbed like a drowning man at a straw.

The anti-alcohol movement was gaining momentum, and Tyrion quickly figured out how to make money — and in a city like New York it was a great opportunity. Tywin Lannister’s friends, who occupied the highest positions in the city, were often their guests; after consulting with some of them and recruiting a team of old school friends, the youngest Lannister got down to business, and soon in small underground bars in New York they sold his booze under the counter. Things went so well that soon Tyrion could afford to move out from their father — what he immediately did.

It was into this shady business that he was going to drag his older brother.

_“My brother and I recently came to the conclusion that he can help me with a case you don’t want to hear about,” he said after dinner, when Tywin Lannister brought them in his study._

_They did not come to any conclusions then, but Jaime knew about his affairs and immediately nodded. Tyrion himself was surprised at his agility._

_“So, being a bootlegger is the limit of your ambitions? Well,” he said, starting to boil, “I tried to make a man out of you, a real man, but apparently it won't work.”_

Jaime moved to his little apartment on Dutch Street — still Manhattan. He turned out to be an absolutely awful helping hand with procedures and paperwork, but Jaime's contribution to building beneficial cooperation relationships was simply invaluable: Jaime had many friends and acquaintances from New Haven, and that was a completely different level. They began to expand, seizing one borough after another, penetrating the districts like an infection, dragging each and every one into their drunken hysteria.

In 1919 Jaime moved out of him to his apartment, and Cersei had a child.

Jaime, their father, Lara and Tyrion himself attended little Joffrey's christening. The youngest brother of Cersei's husband, Renly, was asked to become the godfather —Tyrion heard that Robert's relationship with his middle brother was tense, Stannis was not even at their wedding. Naturally, Tyrion was not even considered for this role, but he was surprised that Cersei did not offer Jaime. He realized why only when he saw the baby in the arms of fifteen-year-old Renly Baratheon.

He experienced many emotions, sitting on the pew in the front row, between his father and brother, but spurt of temper mostly. How could one be such a hypocrite to baptize a child born not just of infidelity, but… he couldn’t even utter that word. The Lord again did not show any signs that he was in control of the situation, and, tired of looking at the priest, Tyrion began to stare at his brother. The new light gray suit fitted him perfectly, although Jaime was hunched over a little as he examined his hands and shiny black boots.

Judging by how diligently the brother avoided looking at everyone in this room, the remnants of fear of divine retribution still had a place to be in his soul. He felt much better when they left the church and breathed in the dusty air that was reaching them from Park Row.

_“To the Plaza Hotel? I want to celebrate,” Robert asked, handing the baby into the arms of the nanny._

No one objected.

That evening, he and his brother brought a lot of alcohol, because at the christening, in addition to the closest relatives (and Lara), there were also Robert's friends, who were fond of whiskey, and the eighteenth amendment was completely forgotten. Jaime was not drinking, apparently wanted to keep a clear mind — but smiled and had fun, like everyone else. A drunken Robert threatened him that they would quarrel violently if Jaime did not drink to the health of his son, but Cersei intervened and asked him to leave his brother alone.

The contributor of the bacchanalia himself had long been at home with the nanny.

Father and Lara left early, and that's when the real party started. They brought more champagne and ice to the women, and the men finally took off their jackets and felt even more freely. Tyrion did not remember the ending: his last memory was Jaime, demanding a phone from the waiter and constantly repeating that he would now get him a taxi.

When Cersei's daughter was born three years later, the celebrations were even louder: Robert was simply bursting with pride when his friends patted him on the shoulder and jokingly called him “a very talented husband.” The girl was tiny and white, like a chick, with light curls and light eyes; when she was dressed in white, she was like a cloud.

“I just don't want her to see this,” Jaime's voice ripped him out of his memory. “And since they also need to be taken away, I’ll do it.”

No, it's not true. He would have taken Cersei alone if he could, but he had to make concessions and take his nephew and niece too. But Jaime had played the role of a caring uncle for five years, and Tyrion did not bother him.

Lara got her way. Their father's wedding was scheduled for the last day of June, and the last thing his brother wanted was to be there himself or to allow Cersei to be there. The trip to Europe was a great excuse to miss not only the event, but also the wave of stories about it, which would just subside by their return in late August. Most likely, that was Jaime's plan.

“So you’re leaving me. Alone,” Tyrion pouted defiantly. Jaime was amused.

The nanny came out of the house, carrying a two-year-old miracle in a light green dress and a matching cap that very much resembled ladies' bell hats. Cersei came after her, holding her five-year-old son by the shoulder with one hand, and holding her tiny leather-strapped purse with the other. She crinkled her nose contemptuously when she saw Tyrion, and he walked away from the car to let her know that he certainly wasn't going with them. Jaime was in the driver's seat, Cersei — in the front seat next to him, and the nanny with the children was in the back, along with the remaining suitcases.

Tyrion walked over to the driver's side window. “I'll send you a telegram when we get to Riviera,” Jaime smiled, pressing the gas pedal. Tyrion grinned and watched the car disappear and hobbled in the direction of his apartment — it was a great day for a little walk.


	2. Old money

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello and thank you for coming back. I'm very nervous, because it's my favourite chapter that I'm about to post, and I hope you won't be disappointed.

They swept across Italy in two weeks: with each new stop-over, the sister's mood deteriorated, and when she was not in the mood, no one was. They stayed in Milan for two days and two nights and left on the first train. Jaime guessed that Cersei had stopped loving this country after her honeymoon, but he did not ask too many questions — did not want to compound matters anyway. The French Riviera was waiting for them — before Robert knew that he would get himself tied up in knotsin work for the whole summer, he rented a villa on the coast, not far from Nice. The trip was almost canceled, until Jaime volunteered to accompany his sister and her children on their first vacation together: after the honeymoon, Cersei did not leave America.

Recently, of the two of them, only Tyrion has been engaged in business, and that is scarcely: the well-oiled mechanism worked almost autonomously, only occasionally requiring the participation of his younger brother in order to spin even faster, bringing in more and more money. Jaime received a percentage — enough to pay his rent, service his car, never come to his sister empty-handed, and always dress according to the latest fashion. A large percentage, generally speaking.

By the time they got to the villa, Jaime wanted only to take a bath, eat and sleep, preferably alone: Joffrey whimpered all the way that he was about to throw up, and although the driver of the car they were in tried to drive so that the child would not get carsick, the whining did not stop. Most likely, he did it simply on the principle — if you started, you must complete it — Cersei had similar attitudes.

She was smarter, so she rode in a different car with Myrcella and the children's nanny, Pammy — the microclimate in their car was definitely warmer.

This was already the third nanny, but so far she lasted longer than her two predecessors; Cersei needed someone who would cope well with the children, but would not teach her how to raise them — and given the interrelation of these wishes with experience, they became almost mutually exclusive. The first one was suitable for Cersei's mother and loved to give instructions, but Cersei did not need advice and parting words; the second was young and pretty, and in between rocking Joffrey in her arms she managed to make eyes at Robert. The third one, Pammy, had been with the Baratheons for three years: she was a year older than Cersei, from a bankrupt, but famous family, not very pretty and got along with the children. The stars aligned, the juste milieu was reached: this girl did not have a single point in which she could feel better than Jaime’s sister, and she did her job well. The children had a permanent nanny, and Cersei had a new specimen for practicing manipulative tactics.

The villa was simply buried in greenery: it turned out to be accompanied by a small garden and a house in which the servant lived. Robert agreed on everything, and the owner was no longer at the villa, only the gardener, the maids, two cooks and a woman, something of a housekeeper, plump and debonnaire: from her white hands and feet Jaime understood that all the stories about the locals were true — they really don't see the sea much often.

_“Monsieur, parlez-vous français?” she asked as they got out of the car. Two not very young, but neatly dressed men began to carry their suitcases, and Jaime mentally exhaled._

_“Oui, mais je préfère l'anglais,” after the war, he didn't really want to speak any language other than his own. *_

_“As you wish, Mr. Baratheon. How was your trip? Oh,” Pammy came up to them with Myrcella in her arms. “What a lovely little girl!”_

Jaime was confused. And angry. The first impression made by him should not be like that... And if it is, then everything is much worse than he thought. He had already opened his mouth to clear up the misunderstanding, but Cersei got ahead of him, jabbering at such a speed that even his fluency in the language was not enough to catch everything. The woman looked at him with her mouth open and her eyes bulging, and continued to nod to his sister.

_“Sir, forgive me my mistake. I did not want to offend you.”_

_“You didn’t offend me at all,” Jaime waved aside, examining the huge open windows and balconies, already imagining how they would dine there in the late evenings and admire the lights of Nice. And then they will make love, until the early morning, until Cersei sends him on his way to his room._

These five weeks were like some endless, paradise, constantly repeating day: in the morning, after breakfast, while the heat was not yet hellish, they went to the beach; it belonged to a hotel in the neighborhood, but they were kindly allowed to be there — well, they couldn't have been not allowed.

He was setting up the sunshades, spreading the beach towels and went swimming, usually alone; Pammy always splashed with children near the shore, and Cersei never went in the water, preferring to lie in the sun. A couple of dozen times, some family men from the hotel tried to make acquaintance; he was asked where they had been from, if he and his wife wanted to join them for dinner. Those men were Americans too, and when they met their fellow citizens, they would certainly be drawn to them. He himself was a little yearning for the boys’ club — but he always refused their invitations politely, adding that he and his _sister_ had just taken her children out for the summer, and that she was a loner and did not trust new people. They had to be discrete, not let anyone near or into their home and their lives; it soon became clear to everyone on the beach that this case was completely hopeless, and they were left alone.

During the day, he decidedly did not know what to do with himself, so he often went to the small library, which was on the first floor, and thoughtlessly turned the pages of books and old magazines — everything to while away the time before dinner. The two of them had dinner together, in the dining room, the doors of which opened onto the terrace where the children and Pammy ate — so he could not forget about caution for a single moment.

He rented a car, a red one. Cersei was angry with him for this. _Too attention-getting_ , she repeated, but he couldn't help himself; red cars drove him crazy. Not like Cersei did, of course, but still.

After dinner, they rode around the neighborhood, just the two of them. The headwind played with her slightly grown hair. When they get home, the very first thing she will do is cut them again. But Jaime liked long hair: it reminded of some things that should have long been forgotten.

He promised her that nothing would happen to him. _I'm bulletproof_ , he joked, knowing that if, for some reason, the bullets whistled past him, it’s only because they must die together. So they promised each other at the age of twelve — two small children, determined to fight death itself. At the front, he did not receive a single wound. The worst injury was inflicted on the first day he returned home.

Jaime did not write about his return — he wanted to surprise the family. He imagined Tyrion cursing when he saw him; in November he should have turned eighteen, and his father must have already begun to turn a blind eye to his affairs. He thought of Cersei's undemonstrative hug in front of their parent, and their first night together after being apart.

The reality has surpassed all possible expectations. Among other things, he could not understand how one could let his only daughter go to a country where a campaign was conducted. It was not on the territory of the entire state, but still; father had to take care of her, guard her, and instead he got rid of her, like the guys on Wall Street get rid of everything apart from their stocks and exchanges — _willingly_.

After they met her at the dock, he remained silent for most of the day. For a family dinner, they drove to the Hamptons, and only there he was able to steal a few minutes alone with her.

They were silent for a long time, because each of them did not know what to say: the first wave of rage that had arisen in him after the news of her wedding subsided as soon as the younger brother told about everything that had happened in his absence. He could no longer blame her, just as he could not stop feeling sorry for himself.

_“Am I that easy to forget?” he asked, looking at his hands, afraid to look into her eyes and read the answer._

Cersei was speechless too, examining the lurid carpet on the floor — Lara brought it here, that's for sure. Then someone called her from the dining room; she sighed, got up from the armchair she was sitting in, asked to excuse her and left. Probably, that was the stupidest question one could think of, but he really wanted to know.

Then her hair was still long, she cut it a little later. He also moved to New York, and when he realized that he would not last another week in this uncertainty, he wrote her a short letter in which he asked Cersei to meet and talk. He didn't have the heart to give it to her personally, so he just threw it into their mailbox — he learnt her new address by heart.

The next day he received an answer, which contained only the date, time and one sentence. _Robert won't be home_. His heart pounded when he thought she was nearby and put the letter herself — but most likely she just asked the servant.

On the appointed day he came to her house; on foot because he did not feel like driving. She was really alone, not a soul, no sounds from the kitchen. The conversation did not take place; she started kissing him almost at the entrance, and he himself could no longer remember how they ended up in her bedroom. She was on clean, ironed sheets, he was atop of her, desperately trying to correct the mistakes that they both managed to make.

He shouldn't have left.

When she informed him that she was pregnant a few weeks later, he was terrified — it was an overwhelming, incomparable fear. Not for himself, of course, for her. Cersei did not seem to be afraid of anything; as soon as she delivered the news, her face turned cold: her smile and luminous eyes did not match what she was about to say. She had a plan, cruel and cold-blooded; she wanted to name her husband as the father of this child.

She was right, as usual. At that time, it was not known how long the prohibition would last — maybe if he knew that the things would take long, he would try to persuade her to leave the country, and maybe even try to acknowledge a newborn baby boy as his own. Not here, but somewhere, where they could feel safe under somebody else's names.

But he did not, neither the boy nor the girl. What was the point? Cersei was right, it was safer this way. So what if they did not bear his last name — but Myrcella looked so much like Cersei, and he himself saw some of his features in Joffrey. He didn't see them very often, maybe once or twice a month... Cersei was saying they had to be careful, and with the children in their huge apartment on the Upper East Side, there became even more people, a lot of them, actually.

Now everything has lost its importance. In this country in the evenings and at night she was only with him, only for him.

“Would you like to go to Paris?” Jaime asked when the order was delivered. For dinner, they decided to go Nice, and warned that they would be back late. Now they were sitting in a restaurant overlooking a small bay, and waited for the waiter to finally leave.

“What for?” Cersei asked absentmindedly.

“For a change of scenery. You and me. For five days.”

She lifted the fork to her mouth, her expression almost unchanged. “I cannot leave Joffrey and Myrcella.”

“I'm sure Pammy can handle them. Say yes.”

From the look she threw at him over the glass, it was clear that she strongly disliked the subtext; he dared to imply that some third person was treating her children so well that they might not notice her absence. She frowned so funny that he involuntarily laughed.

“For two days,” Cersei delivered the verdict, putting down her fork. “And we'll be back.”

A couple of days later, early in the morning, they boarded a train to Paris. They were practically late due to the fact that Myrcella woke up and never wanted to let her mother go, let alone for two days.

“My sunshine, my sweetheart,” she tried to quieten the inconsolable girl, kneeling down to be of the same height as her. “Mommy needs to go on business, but it won't be long. Mommy loves you so much and will definitely bring you something. You have my word.”

He felt some inexplicable pleasure when he saw how she chose him between him and the children — but he also understood that most likely she felt like just an awful mother, leaving her children for a couple of evenings with her brother-lover, and trying to buy them off with toys. “I hate you,” she confirmed his thoughts as they boarded the train, and he just smiled smugly.

_I love you too, sweet sister._

Paris met them already a little drunk; so it seemed to them after a bottle of Beaujolais, which they drank on the way, eating cheese. They stayed at Meurice; he had to ask for two rooms: a double for Cersei and a single for himself. Jaime left her to take a bath and get ready for the evening. Her windows overlooked the Rue Alger, and his overlooked the Tuileries Garden; there was no doubt that she was going to be late admiring the view and they would be late for dinner. He booked a table at a hotel restaurant on the ground floor, a new suit that was kept for a special occasion was ironed for him. Around dinner, he belatedly thought that they could have left for another part of the city, where they would feel more freely, but did not change anything.

Jaime was waiting for her outside the restaurant. He prepared himself for the fact that he would be speechless, but... She finally got a little tan, so her champagne-colored dress no longer made her an ivory statue. The dress had short translucent lace sleeves, and on the right wrist there were several pearl bracelets, echoing the clasps on the shoes.

“We can get inside already,” she told him conspiratorially, as if she was confiding in some secret, and by the twinkle of her eyes he realized that she hadn’t quite sober up yet. Smiling, she bared her teeth, two perfectly white rows of pearls, like on her wrist.

“We can,” he agreed, taking her hand.

It seemed to him that every person was staring at them; Jaime slowly said to himself several times that people had nothing to do with them, and that these were the games of his raging imagination, which was baffled by the fact that they were sitting so openly in the very center of the city of lovers. It was stronger than all their hidden nights on the Riviera because it was real.

Jaime allowed himself to relax and even laughed at the waiter, who was trying to see the ring on his finger. “Vous avez de la chance que ce soit ma sœur,” he said to a young man a little younger than him, trying to speak without an accent, “Si c'était ma maîtresse, je devrais probablement vous dire de la manière la plus cruelle de ne pas regarder mes mains.”

“Il est ivre, lui pardonner,” Cersei smiled insincerely at the departing Frenchman, and as soon as he disappeared behind her, she made her brother a promising face of imminent retribution. “If you can’t control yourself, we will immediately call it a night.”**

He chuckled and smoothed his hair, then reached for his glass.

Her room smelled of eau de toilette and hydrangeas, which stood on all horizontal surfaces. The balcony was ajar, and the wind was faintly stirring the long white tulle curtains. He went to the balcony and breathed in the air of the coming night, trying to memorize it forever so that the memories of this day would become even more vivid. The hydrangeas, eau de toilette, tulle...

“I want you,” she whispered very close, hugging him from the back. He turned carefully, forcing her to disengage her embrace, and took off his jacket, placing it on a dresser. It was not often that Cersei spoke about her feelings so openly, and he suddenly felt obliged to thank her for it.

When his sister was falling asleep on his chest after, he thought that this was the honeymoon they were deprived of. That this is how everything was supposed to happen, that it was not for nothing that her husband was forced to stay in America. He does not replace him, he is in the right place, next to her and their children.

The next day after breakfast, they went to some kind of art exhibition, and then Cersei did what she did best — went to spend money. She bought herself new shoes and gloves, a book about French kings for Joffrey, and a children's porcelain tea set for Myrcella — although because of the hand-painting it cost five times more than any real tea set. She bought new French cuffs for Robert, in her own opinion different from all those that he already had. He himself bought Tyrion a reproduction of a painting at the exhibition, because there had been an ugly stain on the wall of the basement where they poured the whiskey, and it was urgently requiring it to be closed. Cersei did not find this explanation in any way satisfactory. She said he had to look after that painting himself.

She seemed to have forgotten that he hadn’t been Joffrey.

After dinner, they locked themselves in her room again, but only after they brought ice for their drinks. Jaime had no intention of using it for its intended purpose, on the contrary; he had long wanted to see how her body would react to the cold. Clutching a small piece with his lips, he drew barely visible paths on her stomach, listening to her soft moans and watching her shudder when he approached the navel. He hoped to torment her, but only was torturing himself — in the end, the piece of ice was forgotten and melted on the bedside table.

At nine o'clock the next morning, they were already on the train. He begged Cersei to stay at least a day, assured that there was still something to see in the city, but his sister was adamant, and he gave up his attempts. He did not consider himself selfish — he fully realized that she had to make sacrifices, and was grateful for that — but still hoped the children would somehow survive without her one more day. The sister almost took offense at him for this, and he bit his tongue, promising himself to remember more often that these were children and they needed her.

And that these are his children too.

And that he needs her too.

He managed to notice the gardener running towards him, while getting out of the taxi at the gates of the villa — well, at least he wouldn't have to carry everything alone. While he and not very young Julien were figuring out who was carrying what, he heard joyful children's cries and turned his head towards the gates: Pammy dropped the girl’s hand and she ran to his sister as fast as she could, and Cersei squatted down to hug her.

Joffrey continued to run his brush intently across the easel — it was a fine day.

“My sweetheart, my baby girl,” repeated the sister, kissing the child's cheeks, flushed from running, “Mommy promised that she would come soon. Were you a good girl? Did you behave?”

“She was charming, as always,” Pammy smiled, coming closer to them and her fingers interlocked. Cersei kissed her daughter one more time on the cheek, placing her comfortably on her thigh.

“Where’s Joffrey?” she asked, not seeing her son because of the lush jasmine bushes.

Pammy waved her hand in the direction in which the boy was painting, but at the same moment they heard a loud call.

“Madame! Madame!” Albertina, the housekeeper, was rushing with all her might from the side of the villa; her huge breasts fluttered so much that Jaime was afraid that they would hit her in the face.

“Qu'est-ce qui s'est passé?” Cersei asked, stopping halfway and holding her daughter with both hands.

“Il y a un télégramme pour vous de New-York.”

“From whom?”

“Je ne peux pas savoir, madame.”***

Jaime mechanically put the rolled up painting on top of all the belongings on the already loaded gardener, and saw how quickly Cersei handed Myrcella into the arms of the nanny. The telegram got her nervous too: they had not received a single one for two months, only Jaime sent Tyrion a short message, as he had promised. “What was that?” he shouted when he was still far away, so that she knew that he was approaching. A fake smile with which she replied turned her words into a complete antithesis.

“Nothing important, I'm sure.”

She didn't leave the room until dinner, so Jaime had plenty of time for reflection and came up with the worst possible options for what that damn sheet of paper could contain. He even thought that Lara had been so impatient to become a widow, and their father's second marriage had lasted only a month. About half past ten, he came to her bedroom and found her sitting in an armchair by the balcony, with her back to him, already in her nightgown. A nearly full bottle of Bellet blush was standing on the table next to her.

“Can I finally have a look at the telegram?”

“It's there,” Cersei waved her hand vaguely towards the dressing table without turning around. “Take it for yourself if you want.”

He took the telegram with both hands and leaned on the dressing table, legs slightly crossed. _Missing you and the children come back soon robert_. Jaime read the line once again, running his hand over his face. Robert wasn’t missing them before: he had happily sent them to the other side of the Atlantic and hadn’t even seen them off. And now he thinks he has the right to return her with one fucking line?

“So what?” he asked loudly, tired of the oppressive silence.

“What?” 

“Are you going to..?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“Of course you do. Stay here with me and the children.”

“You know perfectly well that I can’t,” she said, leaning on the armrests, getting up and lifting her glass from the table. “Shall we celebrate? Our last evening.”

“No,” he put down the damn sheet and in two steps he was next to her and took the glass from her. “I won't celebrate anything. We will stay here until the end of August,” Jaime looked at his sister for a couple of seconds, marveling at the anger that suddenly found a new object. Suddenly he took her in his arms and carried her towards the bed.

“Let me go,” Cersei whispered viciously and warningly, shrugging her shoulders. “I'll scream.”

“Scream if you want. I don’t mind the audience. I'm so tired, Cersei,” he admitted, throwing her onto the bed and taking off his jacket. “Believe it or not, I almost don’t care.”

In his thoughts, he imagined their last evening in a completely different way: it should be a dinner in some good restaurant overlooking the sea, things already packed, unusually hot August, as if it does not yet know that he will soon be forced to give in the road to autumn. Her hand, gently squeezing his neck, pulled him out of his dreams, and he felt her legs twine around his body. “Let's not fight about that,” she whispered languidly, pressing her whole body against him, her eyes closed. “You don't want this day to ruin everything, right?

She was right again; of course, this was the last thing he wanted. All he wanted to remember was their two nights in Paris, their evening rides in the car and how hot she was breathing in his neck now that he was inside. “I love you,” he whispered, kissing her cheekbones, chin, lips. “I love you so.”

In the morning she informed the children that they were going home in two days; they took this news indifferently and continued to go about their business: arranging the doll’s parties with the new tea set and tearing out the pages from the book, where it was written about too weak kings, because such were not worthy to rule. Albertina spent a long time trying to find out why they were leaving so early and what they didn’t like, but Cersei assured her that everything had been excellent, it was simply “daddy missing the children”.

They reached Paris on a train, from there to Le Havre, and then boarded a steamer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for my French, I tried but failed.  
> *  
> "Sir, do you speak French?"  
> "I do, but prefer English."
> 
> **  
> "You're lucky that's my sister. If it were my mistress, I would say you to stop staring at my hands."  
> "Forgive him, he's drunk."
> 
> ***  
> "What happened?"  
> "There's a telegram for you from New York."  
> "I don't know, madam."


	3. Young and beautiful

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! Here is the most romantic chapter of this work (because it's Cersei's) and I really hope you'll enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I can feel it coming to the end and I'm getting sad:(

It was strange to admit it even to herself, but she was a little glad to see him. Her husband was wearing a nice suit that she had never seen before, he was clean-shaven, with his mustache curled. Standing on the deck with Joffrey, Myrcella and Pammy, Cersei saw Robert trying to spot them in a crowd, but it was in vain. He didn't see them.

As she did not see her short little brother until she set foot on American soil.

Her husband picked Joffrey up, laughing and smiling broadly. “Haven’t you been eating at all? You weigh nothing. But how was it? Did you like traveling with your mom?”

“I did,” Joffrey snapped, swinging his legs, showing with all his body that he wanted to be lowered to the ground. He woke up out of sorts and was naughty from the very morning, and the nasty weather made everything only worse. It could start raining any minute.

“And here is my gorgeous wife,” Robert had already let go of his son and spread his arms in greeting, but she did not like such a charade; when he approached, he simply put his arms around her elbows and kissed her on the cheek. Cersei tried to stand with her back to the passerelle so that Jaime got the least amount of details of this family reunion. “Tan suits you. How are things on the Cote d'Azur?”

With a glance, she asked him to stop clowning and pretending to be God knows whom; the people around them knew the details of their family life perfectly well. Except, perhaps, Tyrion. Jaime was instructing the porters behind them, repeating that the necessary things were in the fourteenth, seventeenth and twenty-fifth cabins. She heard the brothers greet each other and walk in their direction — Pammy and the children had long been sent to the car.

“Thank you for… That we hadn’t had to cancel the trip, I mean,” Robert said to Jaime, finishing smoking as the men with their suitcases walked back and forth to the car. Then a thought occurred to him, which made him uneasy, but he voiced it anyway. “But.. It seems there are too many people in the car.”

“It's okay, I'll just get a taxi,” brother wasn't at a loss, avoiding looking at anyone and glancing at his watch.

As they walked to the car, someone touched her hand and pulled her back. “Let them move away,” Tyrion said quietly, his eyes pointing at her husband and their sibling, walking in front. “You know, I'm extremely surprised that you came back so quickly. It turns out that you are not such a useless wife,” Tyrion was jabbering, as if fearing that she would cut him off. “For richer or for poorer.. Did you bring money?”

“What money?” she asked, not really following the conversation, much more interested in what her brother and her husband were discussing.

“What money? That will save..” his blathering began to get on her nerves, and she glared at him. “Why did you come back then?”

“Since when am I obliged to discuss my family life with you?”

“He didn't tell you,” the dwarf said in the affirmative, as if he had read some news in the Times. He beamed from ear to ear and the lips on his awkward face were somehow pitying, patronizing and contented at the same time. “I want you to know, I have nothing to do with it. Nobody forced him. He…”

“Enough,” Cersei cut him off roughly as they approached Robert's car. “Nothing makes me more dejected than the sound of your voice.”

The younger brother stood next to Jaime on the sidewalk as she got into the car. A couple of drops fell on the glass, and she mentally put a tick in front of the word “practicality”: the cars without roofs were very beautiful, but they were not designed to transport a large family.

“Au revoir, sister!” the dwarf was mocking her, waving his hand like a child. She gave him a look of hatred, Robert laughed, and they drove off into the heavy fall of rain.

He was the perfect husband for a whole week. The four of them went for a walk in Central Park, went to their father and Lara in the Hamptons, where the children were overwhelmed with gifts simply because they arrived, and because they are "sweet and cute." Joffrey hated to be squeezed like a kitten, but because of her age, Myrcella could sit on her “grandma's” lap for hours. Cersei did not remember her mother at all, but she would really like her to see how beautiful her children are, how bright, how kind and decent.

That Friday afternoon Pammy put Myrcella to sleep, and was reading with Joffrey in the living room. For some reason, Robert stayed at home today and was looking after her like after a fading bouquet, which must stand just a little more, and then it could be thrown away. She felt that something was wrong, but she did not immediately realize what was the matter.

“I wanted to ask something,” Robert began, looking out the window and lighting a cigar. Cersei didn’t even turn around — that would have made the smell even stronger. “Did you have any problems with Olivier when recalculating?”

“Recalculating what?” she asked, glancing at the headlines in the Daily News.

“Money, of course. For August. You left earlier.”

She was not going to look at her husband — he and his niggardly inclinations sometimes irritated her incredibly. “We left because you asked us to. Olivier has nothing to do with it. If we had warned in advance that we would move out earlier, he could have time to find new tenants and not incur losses. I didn't ask for a refund,” Cersei finished, turning the page.

At first there was silence, and then she heard him putting out a cigar and he was next to her in two huge, springy leaps. Robert snatched the newspaper from her hand. “Can you pay attention to me when we’re talking?” he asked tartly, and Cersei saw his neck flush over his shirt. She picked up a thin handkerchief, which was next to her, and began to fumble it in her hands.

“So you came back without money?”

“I already said that we…”

“Damn it!” the ashtray fell to the floor with a crash and Cersei dove into the armchair.

“Don’t, please. Joffrey’s in the next room.” Her nails dug into her palm through the fabric of the handkerchief. “What happened? Why would you need money?”

Husband ran a hand through his hair, trying to recover from a sudden outburst of anger, standing with his back to her and catching his breath. His back was tense, and a few beads of sweat were visible on the back of his head, next to his ear. “I deserve to know,” Cersei said. He turned abruptly on his heels and returned to her armchair, leaning over her.

“I want you to understand. This wouldn’t have happened if Tyrion…”

_Tyrion? Why Tyrion?_

Robert explained everything. Cersei would very much like her hated, vicious, tiny brother to be the cause of everything — but her husband was to blame and him alone.

On that day, Tyrion invited Robert to try the first lot of bourbon — he could hardly compare with the one that the Ripy brothers made, but nonetheless. They decided to come together in a speakeasy on Tenth Avenue. Cersei knew what it was, although she had never been there. The fact is that when things went uphill for Jaime and Tyrion, they decided that it was not enough to sell only the alcohol — they needed their own place where they would like to gather with friends once a week, away from the wife and kids in the company of pretty women — so her little brother used to say. The secret director of everything was Tyrion, but the face, the face of the bar was Jaime — he also made sure that the people with the most lined purses in Manhattan knew about the place.

According to Robert, there were many people that evening; some of them he knew, like the chief of the New York police, and someone he saw for the first time — and Tyrion sat him down at a table with such people.

_“It was him who invited me there!” Robert was very nervous. “He had to watch over!”_

He was offered to play poker. When her husband uttered this word, Cersei's throat went up: there was no worse combination in this world than a quickly drunk man and gambling. She tried to portray the most malicious smile she could. “So the tasting session was a success, I assume?” She suddenly remembered that on the day of their return, the short brother said something about money and about salvation. It turns out that Robert asked them to return so that they would take the refund with them. 

“Have you paid already?”

“Not yet. I was counting on rent money.”

“How much more do you need?” Cersei asked, but realized that she shouldn’t have: Robert misunderstood her and knelt by the armchair she was sitting in.

“A hundred thousand.”

“What?” Cersei did not want to mock so openly, but she could not restrain herself and she laughed. “You don’t think that I’ll withdraw this amount from the account that belongs to me and my children, do you?”

“Our children,” her husband corrected, frowning. He got up and went back to the window.

“You could have asked Tyrion. Or my father. You could have let us stay a little longer.” She couldn’t believe she had left Riviera because of some gambling debt.

“I don't want to have anything to do with your brother,” he said nothing about her father; it was clear that asking for money from your father-in-law in order to repay the debt was the first step towards becoming completely dependent on his wife's family. Robert Baratheon liked to believe that if he depended on Tywin Lannister, then by twenty-five percent — and only because his children were Mr Lannister’s grandchildren.

Cersei shook her head. “This is not my concern,” she said, examining the lace trim of the handkerchief. “You have partners and friends, you can transfer the debt. Or you can ask Stannis.” At this point, the husband snorted loudly. “Or Jaime.”

There was silence again. Only the clock on the dresser was counting down the long minutes. One, two, three. Finally, husband spoke again. “Could you ask him on my behalf? Let him write a check. I’ll pay him up.”

She chuckled under her breath, shaking her head, as if she wanted to ask herself how it happened that she was married to this man. By the age of thirty-three, he had learned everything except the ability to lie conscientiously and take responsibilities. “I’ll ask him, but if he refuses, it won’t be be my fault,” Cersei replied, standing up and going to the mirror above the dresser.

“Your job is to ask and that’s all,” Robert said condescendingly, leaving in the direction of the study.

“I'll be back late,” she said louder, without turning around.

“Why so?”

She grinned, turned on her heels, leaned her lower back against the dresser and crossed her arms over her chest. “I want to know what kind of business my brothers have.”

She always wanted to look beautiful, especially for him; her brother was one from that finest breed of men who can make a comment about a new dress, compliment perfume, and even more — memorize and buy something similar. The feeling that someone loves you so much that they are ready to try hard and get by heart your favorite flowers, restaurants and fabrics — this made your head giddy, like good French wine. But today she would hardly be lucky enough to enjoy it, because there was simply no wine in the bar, the entrance to which was inside the bakery.

She arrived late by the standards of the general gathering — and early, based on the time of the show. She walked through the bakery easily, and even climbed the dark stairs down; but at the door, behind which, the shelter of the alcohol deity was hidden, there was a tall man in a shirt and trousers, but without a jacket. “Are you lost, dear?” he asked politely, but not without sarcasm, evaluating her summer fawn-colored coat and a long light dress.

“My brother works here. Jaime. You probably know him, don’t you?” She smiled, trying to look not so satisfied. The man's face changed at once; it wasn’t obsequious, to which she was accustomed, being the daughter of Lannister and the wife of Baratheon, but a curious one: he seemed to mentally imagine her brother’s face and compare how much they were alike.

“One minute, ma'am,” he said, opening the door so only his head could squeeze through it; Cersei immediately heard the loud music and the men’s peals of laughter. “Pod! Pod, come here!”

A minute later, a short, young boy, about nineteen years old, squeezed through. “Evening, ma'am,” he said politely, then turned to the other and put his hands on his hips. “Well, what was that? I’m working, you saw that!”

“Stop cackling and escort Mrs. to the boss,” the first ordered, opening the door. “Move it! Ma'am, please.” He held the door for her, and when it was closed, they were cut off from the rest of the world — there was a celebration of life at the bottom of the little staircase she stood on top.

“Mr. Tyrion isn’t here tonight, but Mr. Jaime is — I think he can help you if ...” the boy babbled as she followed him between the tables, smiling. It was funny how differently they understood “the boss”: this boy clearly thought about her younger brother. But if the matter is decided physically, then victory will be on Jaime's side. That big fellow at the entrance will not allow anyone to disagree with his opinion.

She saw him sitting at the bar; there were several men to his left, but in general there were not too many people yet. They were coming to him, until Jaime saw her and blinked a couple of times — he probably decided he was daydreaming. When he realized that she was quite real, a gentle, indecisive smile appeared on his face — and she could recognize the one she had once fallen in love with, almost ten years ago. “Sir,” Pod broke the spell when Jaime hastily got up and was next to them, “this lady wished to be escorted to…”

“I didn't expect to see you here,” Cersei heard, and his eyes told her that this was the most beautiful event of his entire evening. “Come on, I'll find you a table. You're alone? Good,” he said, as if to himself in response to her nod, and led her to the rightmost table in the front row. Her brother helped her take off her coat, and only then she found out that Pod had been mincing after them all this time. “Hang it next to mine,” he said without looking at him, holding out her coat.

He was obviously excited; her image living in his head was probably just a terrible contrast to the situation. The brick walls of the room were unadorned, here and there were some old movie posters; the lights were yellow and white, but muted, and the tables looked like they were stolen from an antiques store. “I should have dressed differently,” she said awkwardly. In her beige dress with translucent sleeves, she was atavistic. There were several women in the room, but they were dressed more simply.

“You look beautiful,” Jaime said, sitting opposite her. He wanted to add something, but then a tall middle-aged man approached them. He didn’t look like a guest, but he didn’t look like a waiter either. “Sir, we should get started,” he said softly, and Jaime nodded quickly.

“I know, I know. Just a minute. Selmy, do you know my sister?”

“Haven't had the pleasure, sir.”

“This is Selmy, our pianist,” her brother said, standing up and lightly patting the man on the shoulder. “He’s a painter, a painter who uses notes… And this is my sister, Cersei,” he should have introduced her as Mrs. Robert Baratheon, but she was alone, and Jaime was so nervous and confused.

“ I'm honored, ma'am,” the pianist kissed her hand and looked at her brother once again, then returned to the piano.

“Tyrion isn’t here tonight,” Jaime said, leaning slightly towards her, “and I seem to be in charge. Got to see if everything's okay. Hate to leave you, but if you can stay, we can talk later. Would you like that?”

Cersei nodded — she hated the idea of talking in a gradually filling room, trying to shout down the music and drunken exclamations. The conversation she came with was of a completely different, intimate nature.

In her short, not so interesting life, she had seen not many bars — and this one, she was sure, was no different from them. They played the same jazz, drank the same whiskey, and even relatively dressed women on the impromptu stage were like copies of each other. Cersei was not bored, but she was not interested either; she could not relax until she had expressed everything she came with. She should wait for this evening to end.

Jaime was barely meeting her eye; only three times he came up and asked if everything was alright and if she had time. Each time she answered the same thing, and each time his smile grew wider — in sync with the amount of whiskey he drank. Obviously, it was impossible to coordinate the work of the speak-easy without the bottle.

The first people began to leave at about two, and by half-past three there was no one left at all; Pod and Bronn — as it turned out, that was the name of the savage at the door — turned the chairs, placing them on the tables, and a young man even younger than Pod was working at the counter, wiping the glasses with a towel.

“Forgive me,” Jaime said, taking a seat opposite to her. The evening exhausted him so much that he was no longer wearing his jacket and vest, the bow tie was untied and lay around the collar, and his face seemed to be a little wet — Cersei guessed that he washed it in cold water wanting to sober up a bit. “I should have sent them to hell right away, and.. Didn't you take anything for yourself?” He asked, realizing that the almost empty glass of whiskey he had come with was the only one on the table.

“I wanted something soft, but you don’t have this here.”

“But I can ask them to look for champagne. You want?”

Cersei reasoned that one glass would not make it worse. The only surprise was the very assumption that they might have it. “Jon!” He shouted, turning to the counter.

“Yes, sir?”

“Look for some champagne for my sister,” he stubbornly continued to call her “my sister,” as if he wanted everyone to know about it, as if he wanted to be in some way involved in her splendor and glow.

Cersei decided to get down to business bluntly. “Robert needs money,” she said in an undertone, so that the people doing their job would not hear her. “He would like to know if you can lend it.”

She realized that she started wrong from the moment she finished the sentence: Jaime must have thought that she had come to see him — for the last time they had seen each other on the dock — and there she was, immediately telling him the purpose of the visit. He tried to hide his annoyance behind indifference as quickly as possible, but she got it anyway.

“If your husband has no money, what I very much doubt, then he should have the courage to ask me about it personally,” the brother answered dryly, looking into her eyes. Cersei was once again surprised at how much he became like the father when he started doing business — she always wondered if she could do the same.

“Perhaps, but it’s me asking now,” Jon put a wine glass in front of her, a bottle in an ice bucket and left with an empty tray. “So I need your answer. Yes or no.”

It was evident that he was fighting with himself; on the one hand, he wanted to refuse Robert, but on the other... Cersei guessed which side would win, but she was filled with respect for his thinking. “Yes.”

_He didn't even ask how much was needed._

She touched the stem of the wine glass and noticed that he was following her fingers. “Put it on my bill,” he shouted to John, turning to the counter for a second.

"Do you pay for the drinks at your own place?" Cersei snorted.

“Tyrion says I should do that if I don’t want to turn into a drunkard by thirty.” 

The way he pronounced the phrase did not escape her; as if he was quoting an older friend, a boss, or even their father — someone whose statements could be taken for granted without evidence. It was even funny. But she had a lot of power over Jaime, and if she and Tyrion had to argue, she would still win.

“Do you have something else to say?” he asked no less hostilely, intending to be offended further.

Yes, there was something else to say.

It started on the way back to America, and she decided that it was her seasickness, from which she seemed to be healed, making itself felt again. Stepping on her native land, she exhaled — but the morning after it happened again. It was good that there was nobody with her then; speculation and whispering can be terribly difficult to shout down, especially if they are true. Cersei looked down at the lace handkerchief, which had already suffered this morning, and once again wondered if he needed to know.

Of course he did. He would have understood everything a little later.

“I’m with child,” she said quietly but stubbornly, lifting her head and looking her brother in the eyes.

Jaime's mouth opened slightly and the corners of his lips twitched; he finished the rest of his whiskey in one gulp and looked at her again. His smile and look were more eloquent than any poster on the wall, and they could be read with the same ease; he smiled because that was what must have happened; his eyes were shining because their honeymoon, as he called their little failed trip, now had something that would remind them of those days on the coast for the rest of their lives, the days when they were really happy.

“You haven't told him yet?” Jaime asked in a voice slightly hoarse with excitement.

She shook her head negatively. “He would have suspected something. After returning, we‘ve done it only...”

“I don’t want to know,” her brother interrupted rudely; it was amazing how quickly his mood changed from blissful happiness to aggressively jealousy. Jaime was sitting in front of her, leaning his forearms on the table, holding his glass with the fingers of both hands, and all she could think about was his patience, that may end one day. As well as love. Love often dies too.

“Will you still love me?” it suddenly burst out from her against her will. “Not now, then. When I'm no longer young and …”

“... beautiful?” He finished, and Cersei saw that the clouds on his face began to dissipate. “You needn’t ask.”

Pod brought her a coat, and all the clothes for Jaime, and the two of them went out into the street. Up here, the dawn was already playing hide-and-seek with the night behind the high-rises on 135th and Convention Avenue. The soft orange light made Jaime's hair even brighter, and his eyes turned from green to amber, like the eyes of a wild cat, like the whiskey he had drank. “I'll get you a taxi,” he promised, getting out a little closer to the road, and soon a black car pulled up in front of a small, unremarkable bakery.


	4. Lucky ones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello and thank you for coming back! I was quite busy this week, 'cause my boyfriend came to our hometown from where he studies now due to the pandemic, and I was trying to spend my time with him, so I'm a little bit sorry.
> 
> Here is the last chapter of "National anthem" and I hope you won't hate me for it.

Cersei died on April 3rd, 1925, giving birth to her second son. Tyrion was informed by his father, who had called him at about half past six in the evening. It was the worst phone call he ever received in a small apartment on Dutch Street.

The midwife and the doctor could not save her, and another doctors that went up to the apartment could only state the fact of death — as if it was less obvious without them. Suddenly widowed husband needed help himself, so one of the doctors attacked Pammy, who locked two crying children in the farthest room with one of the maids. She was asked questions about the relatives of the deceased, whom one could call — and we must pay tribute to her quick wits — Pammy gave them father’s phone number.

While Tywin Lannister presented all the information he knew in his usual style — as if he were reporting the fall in stocks, as if he were a broker — a million thoughts flooded Tyrion's head; at first it was satisfaction. There was something terribly fatal in the fact that his sister died for the same reason as his mother, for whose death she blamed him since she learned how to speak. He even managed to see the divine punishment, which finally overtook his older sister for all her sins, voluntary and involuntary. Then he experienced a burning shame. Who is he to judge that she was worthy of death? There was also time to bless the Lord for it was the father who was called first, and not..

_“The child is healthy.”_

He could not yet realize that this boy would see his mother only in old photographs. As would the niece; hardly a three-year-old child will be able to remember anything other than vague images. Joffrey will probably feel the worst; as the eldest, he understood a lot if not everything. Whatever person the sister was, her children loved her, it could not be denied.

_“Call your brother. I'm on my way to New York.”_

Damn coward. So, the fuse of father's tenderness was enough only to tell him that he should call Jaime himself? For a second, he thought that it was not just that, maybe father had seen, heard or guessed something. However, such thoughts vanished as soon as they were born; Tywin Lannister, as always, was driven by pragmatic calculation.

_“Don't come to them. It’s sick there now even without you,” he spat out half-irritated, hanging up the phone._

Having called the parent a coward twenty more times , Tyrion slowly dialed his brother's phone number. There was an answer neither the first time, nor the third. The sun was starting to set slowly, and Tyrion felt sticky sweat on his hands until he thought about the bar; where else could Jaime be on Friday night?

Jaime answered almost instantly.

“I’m listening,” his voice whispered softly through the noise of the telephone line.

“Jaime, it's me.”

“Glad to hear you,” his brother's voice warmed. “Are you coming tonight? Shouldn’t we start without you?”

Tyrion raked the skin on the bridge of his nose with his fingers. It probably should have started with relatively good news. Although, no good news will save the bearer bringing bad ones.

“Cersei gave birth. It’s a boy and he's is hale and hearty,” he suddenly realized that he thought of him as of little Joffrey. He had not yet seen this child, but something told him that his father was the same as that of the first two.

“And Cersei? She's fine?” Jaime asked after a short silence, and Tyrion could not resist exhaling — his heart sank in his chest. Jaime was always interested in only one thing, and he didn't care about the rest. Tyrion raised his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. It had several orange stripes from the setting sun. Was she watching the same when she died?

“I can't hear you, Tyrion. Is Cersei all right?”

“She died.”

What he tried so hard to find expressions for ended up clothed in two short words that should have killed his brother like any gangster bullet. The creaking in the phone receiver only intensified, and behind it Tyrion could not even hear his brother’s breathing.

Finally, Jaime broke the silence by speaking in a completely different, mechanical voice.

“I'm leaving now.”

"Don't," Tyrion said wearily, running his hand over his face. “Father has forbidden. He will deal with everything, you know our father..”

Jaime said nothing, and on the other end of the line Tyrion heard the sound of drawers being pulled out. “You’re probably right. I can’t do anything,” brother said and hung up the phone.

“Jaime!” Tyrion yelled into the phone, feeling some kind of anxiety rise up his throat from nowhere. “Don't you dare hang up, you bastard! I.. Jaime!”

The redial was unsuccessful, and grabbing his coat, Tyrion ran down the stairs, hoping he could quickly catch the car. The taxi drove unbearably long, as if choosing the most roundabout ways, and in the end, Tyrion could not stand it: he threw a few coins on the seat and jumped out into the air. There was only one block left.

When he ran into the bar, he was greeted by Pod, and the guy's eyes have never been as wide as they were now — even when they ordered his first striptease for his birthday. “We called your apartment, sir, but..”

He went into their shared office, and it seemed to him that he had seen this picture before. The red-brown smudges were visible on the brick wall, on the filing cabinet, on the floor and on the white shirt. Bronn was sitting on his haunches beside the body, and he turned as Tyrion closed the door behind him.

_“Blew his brains out. Isn’t an idiot?”_

Brother was lying on the floor with a revolver in his right hand; before that, Tyrion did not even know that he had a weapon, as well as the fact that he kept it here. His face was calm and even somewhat relaxed, and in the first second Tyrion was overcome with anger that of all the ways to report the death of his sister, he had chosen the phone. These were the consequences of his cowardice.

_“What's left for us when guys like that put the bullet in their own heads?” Bronn laughed mirthlessly._

Tyrion was silent, continuing to look at the head, on which blood had already begun to clot, at the golden hair in a burgundy pool, at the strong body, where the heart was beating, driving a viscous red liquid through the veins until recently.

_“What had to happen for someone like your brother to shoot himself?”_

He shot himself. His brother shot himself. “Idiot,” said Tyrion mentally, not knowing in whose address — Jaime, Bronn or his own. He should have come here. Everything could be expected from Jaime all his life.

He called his father about an hour later, when the police had already left. Words were no longer chosen: he did not care if this news finally smite his father, and he will not recover. Tywin Lannister endured everything with his usual inherent composure — but even on the phone Tyrion was able to catch the difference in his answers, and he suddenly felt sorry for his sister, so much so that he got lockjaw. He himself did not expect this. Although, perhaps, it happened because Jon poured him neat vodka.

Cersei's funeral was entirely undertaken by her father; he also decided that she would be buried in the family plot next to her mother, where he also saved a place for himself. The younger children were left at home with a nanny, but Joffrey sat between Robert and Lara throughout the service. Tyrion used to think of him as a capricious, pampered, spoiled child, but even he was painful to see how the child's lips trembled every time his eyes found the open coffin again. The dark tweed suit in which he was dressed made him even paler, almost transparent, like the tears that stood in the corners of boy's eyes. He looked much more like Jaime, but if he took something from his mother, then those were her brightest emerald eyes.

With Jaime it turned out to be much more complicated. Despite the promised reward, all the priests whom Tyrion approached refused to carry out the suicide funeral. A person who took his own life had no right to be buried next to those close to him — only on the outskirts of the cemetery, away from those whose road to heaven is lined with prayers. Tyrion promised his father that if this happens, he will personally unearth his brother's body and reburial it; father killed him with a glance, and yet found a needy man of the cloth ready to conduct a small service at his own risk.

Jaime was buried next to Cersei, and Tyrion suddenly felt that it should be so. It was difficult to say where they went, but now they were together, and there they were better, wherever “there” was.

Tyrion was endlessly surprised at how soon the “child question” was resolved. Robert agreed with all the reasons given, and it was decided that five days a week the children would live with their grandfather, and on weekends the would see their father. This was a pleasant shock for Tyrion, and an unpleasant one for Lara; she loved children, but only as long as there was an opportunity to send them back.

_“These are my grandchildren,” her father simply told her during one of the conversations Tyrion witnessed. “The only reminder of my daughter and son,” after these words Tyrion sweated profusely and tried not to look up from the grass beginning to turn green. But Tywin Lannister had something else in mind. The three blond angels were a memory of her sister, and Cersei was never seen separately from Jaime. Many twins are annoyed when they are considered one creature, but his brother and sister never paid attention to this. “Perhaps these are the only grandchildren that I will have. And they will live here. If this somehow does not coincide with the life that you saw for yourself, I will gladly give you a divorce.”_

Naturally, Lara did not need a divorce. Fortunately, she did not yet know that she would try to replace their mother with such an endeavor.

Later, he learned that Cersei knew about her third child. She was even allowed to hold him, after which she smiled and said that he was very sweet and that she would like his name to be Tommen. Then she closed her eyes, and only then the doctor understood that something was wrong. So she died — without regaining consciousness.

Pammy moved to Hamptons with young Baratheon children; everyone agreed that the more familiar faces the children see, the better it will be for them. For the first six months Myrcella cried and called for her mother at night — but, it seems, she soon realized that it was useless and stopped.

Now she was already eight — and she was sitting in the living room on the sofa with Lara looking at old photographs, while Tyrion, who had come to visit for his father's birthday, read the newspaper in his armchair. Outside the window, snow fell in plump flakes and immediately melted.

“Is that mom?” Myrcella asked, pointing at someone in the photograph, and Tyrion involuntarily pricked up his ears. No one ever hid the fact that they once had a different life — especially since they often visited their father, who worked in New York.

“Yes, sunshine, that’s your mom,” Lara said tenderly, stroking her golden, wavy hair. Tyrion could not resist and went up to them; in the hands of the girl was an old photograph, in which Cersei was sitting in the garden on some kind of blanket, with baby-Myrcella in her arms. The girl's fists rested on her sister's outstretched palms, and they were both smiling.

“Shall I grow up as beautiful as she was?” Myrcella asked, looking up from the photo.

“Of course, you will” the woman said, smiling expertly.

“You need to dream not about being beautiful, but about being wise,” the father said edifyingly, entering the room. He sat down on the vacant armchair and crossed his legs. Age stubbornly did not want to affect his natural grace. “Your mother was the most beautiful woman in this city. Did it bring her a lot of happiness?”

“Your daughter didn’t die because she was unhappy,” Lara said reproachfully, but Myrcella interrupted her and nodded to her grandfather.

“I understand, grandpa.”

Lately Tyrion himself has heard lectures from him. Most often, these were lectures that it was time for him to calm down, transfer the management of the bar chain to someone and have a family and children. As if it were that simple. As if he wanted to. All Tyrion wanted in the last five years was to be forgotten.

He still envied them. They swept bright and fast, like a comet, having received their fair share of recognition, and burned out just as quickly. They seemed to know in advance that this world would not offer them anything better, and left at the very peak. Tyrion chuckled, thinking that that was what Cersei, for sure, wanted to be remembered for: the untimely departed young beauty, and people would be passing next to her grave and would sigh sadly. She used to say that she always got what she wanted.

Jaime was also lucky. Tyrion knew like no one else that the burden of responsibility that had been weighing on him from childhood really melted away only with his death. He was remembered much less often than Cersei, and so he wanted; he wanted to disappear, so that no one’s long, grabbing hands could reach him, the hands which could take away the only thing that was of value to him.

The brother, unlike Cersei, did not manage to leave something behind. The owner of the apartment in which he lived began to rent it out again; their father sold his car because no one needed it. Their bar ran for a few more years before closing permanently, and then Tyrion closed it — just in time to avoid the losses caused by the depression. There was enough money, he did not regret anything.

Jaime left behind only a story; the story about a man who loved and could not tell anyone about it. A story about lies, sacrifice and love. The brother was unlucky enough to fall in love with this particular woman — but, in the end, she loved him in return; can we talk about bad luck then?

Every now and then the stars align. Someday fate will be kind to him too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much for reading! I was very afraid to publish this work since there were a lot of fantastic fics already and no one would be interested in my graphomania (as I thought), but you were so kind to me, so...
> 
> Soon I'm gonna translate another work, which was written in December 2020, after one of my favorite musicians released her new album. You will find out what my favorite song from this album is, and what my favorite movie ever is. Hope to meet you all in the comments!


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